Trying to Manipulate God

1 Samuel 4

We cannot manipulate God into doing what we want, but the Israelites try to do that in this lesson. First we look at their story, then we personalize it and talk about what we should do when God is not answering our prayers the way we wish He would.

A Battle with the Philistines - 1 Samuel 4:1-4

For some reason, the Israelites went to battle with the Philistines. They were the people who lived on the coast, and because the Israelites didn’t drive them out in the beginning, they had a foothold in that area. The two sides were constantly at battle with one another over territory and power. The battle took place in the land of Ephraim, on its northwestern border with the Philistines. First, they encamped opposite one another. Then, they went to battle, and the Israelites were defeated, losing 4,000 men in the plains of Philistia.

The Israelites had been through enough battles to know that they did not win or lose on their own merit, but because it was the Lord’s will. It is to their credit that they recognized God’s hand in their defeat. But the praise of them ends there. Instead of going to God and asking why He did not fight for them, they tried to manipulate Him into giving them victory..

When the Israelites first entered the Promised Land, they defeated the large, fortified city of Jericho. But they lost their next battle to a very small town just a few miles to the west. The people were devasted. But instead of just gathering more men and weapons to defeat the people in Ai, Joshua went to the Lord asking why they had been defeated. The Lord told him that someone in their camp had disobeyed His orders and taken spoils from Jericho, bringing destruction to everyone. Then, God explained how to find out who did it and what to do with him. Once they’d done away with the sin, they were able to go against Ai again and defeat them easily (Joshua 7).

This is what the Israelites should have done after this defeat, though the problem was Phinehas and Hophni, and God had already sentenced them to death. But the rest of Israel did not have to go down with them. Nonetheless, they did not consult the Lord and decided that they must have lost because He wasn’t with them. Because God’s presence dwelt with them between the cherubim on the mercy seat of the ark of the covenant, they decided to go against the Philistines again, taking the ark with them this time (Exodus 25:22). They mistakenly believed that it could save them from their enemies, as if it had some special power.

God’s Spirit hovered over the mercy seat, but His glory was not restricted. 1 Kings 8:27 Today, His Spirit dwells in every believer at the same time (Acts 2:38-39). Just because His Spirit was always with them in the Tabernacle, He did not exclusively reside there. Acts 7:48-50 He is omnipresent because He is not only Father and Son, but also Spirit. (Matthew 28:19) Jeremiah 23:23-24 This may not have been fully understood by the Israelites at this time, but it didn’t matter. The power for victory came with God, not the ark. If God was the one that defeated them, as they’d already acknowledged, then it didn’t matter if God was “physically” present with them or not. He had no intention of giving them the power to win. Psalm 20:7; Romans 8:31; 1 Samuel 12:15

The Philistines Know God’s Power - 1 Samuel 4:5-9

But they believed the ark could help them. So, Hophni and Phinehas brought it into the camp, and all the soldiers shouted with joy. When the Philistines heard the ark was with the Israelites, they knew it meant that their God was with them, too. This made them very afraid because they knew that Israel’s God had great power. All the surrounding nations had heard about the plagues in Egypt and how God had delivered them with a mighty hand (Joshua 2:10). They were certain they would now be defeated. Back then, every nation had their own gods who they believed had power. But even the Philistines worried that Israel’s God might be more powerful than theirs.